Pages

Thursday, July 6, 2017

How To Organize And Store Food In Your Kitchen

As the kitchen is the heart of any family home, and you’ll find yourself in there throughout the day whether it’s to cook or eat with the family; you want it to be an organized haven and an enjoyable place to be. You may well keep your kitchen immaculately clean; however, where you store your food and ingredients can have an effect on how smoothly your kitchen space can run. The following are some things to take into consideration if your kitchen is due to be reorganized, and if you need to start unpacking what you bought from the grocery store n a different fashion.

Your Refrigerator

The first place that you’re likely to head after you’ve been shopping for food is the fridge freezer; it’s essential to get certain things into a cool and cold environment as soon as possible. Therefore, you’ll want to grab all your dairy first, and head towards the middle and door area of the refrigerator. Milk should go on the bottom shelf; however, many of the large bottles don’t fit in there, and you run the risk of spillages, so you can pop it in the side of the door instead, so it’s easy to grab when the kids want cereal. Butter, cheese, and eggs should be where the temperature is most consistent; so right in the middle where you can grab them with ease, is perfect.

Your fresh fruit and vegetables will have their own designated drawers to sit in; many veggies like a little humidity, so the vegetable drawers will provide the right environment for storing them successfully. Keep your pre-packed salads, and crispy leaves in the original packaging will help to retain their freshness for longer. It’s also super easy to reseal the bags with a suitable clip or tie, so you can grab a handful of lettuce whenever you need to liven up a sandwich or meal.

Most fruit prefers low humidity, which is why there’s a separate drawer in most fridges; this will help apples and pears stay crunchier for longer (yum). Lemons and other citrus fruit can quite happily survive out of a storage bag, so don’t worry too much about wrapping them up before you pop them in the fridge. Try and avoid the temptation of washing your fruit and veg after you’ve bought them home, and just before they go into the refrigerator; too much moisture can promote the growth of mold, which can then spread around each area.

Raw meat and fish should go on the very bottom shelf of the fridge (you may have to move some items from there) so that any potential blood and juices don’t drip and contaminate the rest of the food. Again, the bottom of the refrigerator is often the coldest, and the colder the environment is, the better and fresher your raw meat will be. It’s vital that any raw meat and fish produce is packaged and as airtight as possible; it’s the only way to ensure that bacteria from each item doesn’t spread to foods that won’t be cooked.

The door of your fridge is usually the warmest; so soft cheeses, mayonnaise, ketchup, and other condiments can happily live there. If you’re running out of room in the main area of your cooler, then you can also move any hard cheeses and butter to the shelving in the door too. Any fruit juices and soda can live wherever you have space left, and it will often depend on how cold you want them; so put them away last of all, as they don’t need to be urgently stored.

Your Cupboards And Shelves

Your shelves, cabinets, and if you’re lucky enough to have one, your pantry space, can hold a multitude of ingredients to add to all of your best recipes, so it’s worth putting some thought into organizing them carefully. Think about items that you grab the most; if salt and pepper are a seasoning must-have in your culinary space, then store them somewhere that you can reach with ease. Your dried herbs and spices should also go somewhere accessible, so that you can grab them and liven up your cooking, without having to search for ages.

Bulky cans and jars that provide the base of one-pot and liquid cooking should be stacked neatly and kept in a cupboard that’s easy to access. You don’t want any accidents if you have to lift a heavy jar while you stand on

stool; so the bottom shelf of one of your kitchen cabinets is the perfect place for chopped tomatoes and chickpeas.

When it comes to your rice, pasta, and dried noodles; you can make a feature out of them by decanting them into various jars and displaying them on your kitchen shelves. For some kitchen storage solutions, take a look here. However, if you don’t want to display your food, you can simply leave them in their original packaging and pop them in a cool, dry cupboard or pantry space. As these are often frequently used ingredients to many meals; you should again, put them somewhere you can access with ease, to avoid spillages (you don’t want to be picking up dried rice for weeks to come).

If you enjoy spending time in your kitchen and are passionate about cooking a variety of meals; you’re likely to have an array of different cooking oils and vinegars. Ingredients in glass bottles can make decorative and attractive items on your kitchen countertop, and you’ll want to be able to give your pan a good glug of something at the beginning of each meal. Therefore, you can create a shelf inside a cupboard, or outside as an interior design feature, to house your array of dinner staples.

Back to some fruit and vegetables again; potatoes, onions, and garlic prefer a dry, dark, and cool environment when they are being stored. Therefore you might want to invest in a container that will fit into one of the cupboards under the counters in your kitchen, and that will comfortably house the veg that doesn’t want to live in the fridge. By working out what you use the most in your cooking; you’ll be able to figure out a storage system that works best for you and your family.